Wednesday this week we reported that Sarah Palin received in total "only" $ 35,000 from the Lane County Republican Party for her appearance in Eugene, Oregon. This information wasn't too difficult to get hold of, as the Lane County Republicans were forced to diligently report their expenses to the Oregon Secretary of State, who then made the data available for public access.

Sarah, now that the secret is out: Just admit the real facts and acknowledge that this whole mess was caused by your insatiable greed. You had the opportunity to do something for good and donate your services in this instance for free in honor of the University's 50th birthday. It's not as if you haven't donated your speaking fees before!

However, we never claimed to know the final amount of the expenses, we said "ca." and "approximately". In any case, $ 1,000 more or less wouldn't make a real difference here, given the outrageous sum in total that the CSU Stanislaus foundation pays Sarah Palin for delivering her worn out talking points for the 100x time.

Palin Fee to CSU Reported at Over $75,000 – More Than Double What She Charged Local GOPTuesday, May 25, 2010

As university violates state law, information continues to trickle out

SACRAMENTO – The Modesto Bee is reporting that a Sarah Palin watchdog website has uncovered Palin’s fee to speak at California State University Stanislaus. The Palingates blog reports that Palin will be paid up to $93,000 for her upcoming visit. The amount would be more than double what Palin charged a local Republican Party in Lane County, Oregon, when she appeared at an event for $35,000, according to documents accessed on the Oregon Secretary of State website.

“If these figures are accurate, clearly CSU got a bad deal and Sarah Palin gouged California students,” said Senator Leland Yee (D-San Francisco). “Celebrities should not be trying to line their own pockets at the expense of students, especially at a time when our public higher education system is in such dire straits.”

According to sources, the university transferred two payments of $37,500 each to the Washington Speakers Bureau – the entity in which the university contracted for the Palin event. In addition to the $75,000 speaking fee, the university is paying $18,000 for Palin to receive a hotel suite, first class airfare or a private Lear jet, and “bendable straws,” among other expenses.

“If Ms. Palin truly cared about our students, she should have waved her speaker’s fee or at least not overcharged,” said Yee. “Every dollar that goes to Palin is another dollar not going to the students at Stanislaus, who have already seen their scholarships lost this year. This is just the latest in a long series of bad decisions by CSU foundations and auxiliaries which demonstrate why we need greater transparency and accountability.”

Last week, CSU Stanislaus released hundreds of documents that further show that university officials violated the California Public Records Act by not disclosing documents requested March 31 from Californians Aware and Senator Yee.

Among the documents uncovered is an email correspondence between CSU Chancellor Charles Reed and Bernie Swain, chairman of the Washington Speakers Bureau, that reveal documents were withheld simply to avoid “another round of newspaper stories.”

The documents disclosed also show hundreds of correspondence between university officials and a partisan public relations firm on how to handle the public scrutiny.

The scandal has spurred Attorney General Jerry Brown to launch a formal investigation and Californians Aware to file a lawsuit in Superior Court.

On April 9, CSU student Ashli Briggs was informed that suspicious activity (specifically, document purging) was taking place within the administration building. After seeing several administrators’ cars in the parking lot on the university’s scheduled furlough day, Alicia Lewis and other students found several public documents in a campus dumpster.

Many of the public documents were shredded, presumably by university personnel. Among the intact documents were financial statements, university spreadsheets, and staff assignments, as well as pages 4 through 9 of the Palin contract.

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